Web Terminal Operator version 4.18 is incorrectly installed on OpenShift 4.17 or older clusters

Solution Verified - Updated

Environment

Issue

For several hours on February 3, 2026, Red Hat released 4.18 Red Hat Operators catalog content into 4.12-4.17 clusters. The tags have since been recovered to point at catalogs appropriate for their 4.y. Clusters running 4.12 through 4.17 versions during the window from 2026-02-03 21:16 UTC through 2026-02-04 05:18 UTC were impacted by the 4.18 catalog content.

Specifically, the operators with installPlanApproval:Automatic on Subscription.operators.coreos.com which had updates recommended in the 4.18 catalog had their installed operator version updated to the version present in the 4.18 catalog, regardless of whether that version was appropriate for the version of OCP that the cluster was running.

Resolution

The remediation strategy is to perform a targeted downgrade by uninstalling the 4.18 Web Terminal Operator and reinstalling the version compatible with your cluster.

IMPORTANT: Do NOT remove any web terminal DevWorkspace CR during the procedure

  1. Uninstall the problematic version of the operator via CLI oc/kubectl or OperatorHub UI in the OpenShift Console -> Installed Operators -> Web Terminal -> Uninstall Operator

  2. After uninstalling the previous version, navigate to OperatorHub UI in OpenShift Console -> Operators > OperatorHub. Search for 'Web Terminal' and follow the UI prompts to install the desired version.

  3. Verify the successful installation. It should contain entry for Web Terminal Operator.

$ oc get csv -n openshift-operators

N.B. See the product pages for the supported versions

As of today, February 19, 2026, the following versions of the Web Terminal Operator are supported:

  • 1.15 (for OCP 4.20) — Full Support until May 03, 2026.
  • 1.14 (for OCP 4.19) — Maintenance Support until December 17, 2026.
  • 1.13 (for OCP 4.18) — Maintenance Support until August 25, 2026.
  • 1.12 (for OCP 4.17) — Maintenance Support until April 01, 2026.
  • 1.11 (for OCP 4.16) — Extended Update Support (EUS) until June 27, 2026.

Root Cause

On 2026-02-03, the v4.18 redhat-operators catalog was accidentally pushed to v4.12 and v4.16 and similar tags. Clusters running those older OCP versions got caught up on that v4.18 content and failed to automatically recover when recovered catalog content was shipped (OCPBUGS-75921). In addition, some clusters had enabled automatic OLM-installed operator updates. For those clusters, if the 4.18 catalog contained recommended update advice from the version the clusters were currently running, the OLM-installed operator would be automatically updated, potentially to a version that is not actually compatible with the version of OCP the cluster is actually running.

Diagnostic Steps

For several hours on February 3, 2026, Red Hat released 4.18 Red Hat Operators catalog content into 4.12-4.17 clusters.

For more information, including Diagnostic Steps, please refer to Red Hat Operator has version higher than the cluster version.

SBR
Product(s)
Components
Category

This solution is part of Red Hat’s fast-track publication program, providing a huge library of solutions that Red Hat engineers have created while supporting our customers. To give you the knowledge you need the instant it becomes available, these articles may be presented in a raw and unedited form.